Activities 2014-2015

September 2014

GEMMA 8th Edition Opening Act

On Monday, September 22nd, the 8th edition of GEMMA Erasmus Mundus Master’s Degree in Women’s and Gender Studies was presented in the Assembly Hall of the Scientific Documentation Centre of the University of Granada. The event was chaired by the GEMMA Consortium Coordinator, Adelina Sánchez Espinosa, the Academic Coordinator in Granada, Mª José Osorio Pérez, and the Secretary of the University Institute of Women's and Gender Studies, Amalia Morales Villena. Some of the students and scholars of this new edition attended the event.

acto bienvenida

Invited Scholars

Mine Ozyurt, associate professor in the Department of English Language and Literature at Dogus University, Istambul, was the first scholar invited to speak as part of the module Feminist Research: Case Studies II -coordinated by professor Adelina Sánchez Espinosa-. Her lectures were on September 23rd, 24th and 25th. She focused on the following subjects:

  • Representations of Motherhood in Literature
  • Gender-Bending Fantasies in Women's Writing
  • Women and Writing

October 2014

Acción en Red: As a complement to the module History of Feminism: Women’s Movements around the World, coordinated by professor Victoria Robles Sanjuán, first year students attended a meeting on October 10th with a group of volunteers Acción en Red. The meeting took place at the Acción en Red office in Granada, where volunteers organised a workshop called “Implícate por la igualdad: Por los buenos tratos”. This program calls for volunteers to intervene in the prevention of gender-based violence, to become conscious, to educate themselves and to participate in debates in their volunteer spaces.

  • Learn more about Acción en Red and its programme.

Montserrat Cabré i Pairet, from the University of Cantabria (Spain), was an invited scholar for the module Gender, body and women in Western History: health practices and scientific discourses -coordinated by professor Teresa Ortiz. Professor Cabré got her PhD in Mevieval History at the University of Barcelona and she is currently a tenured professor of History of Science at the University of Cantabria, where she founded and directed the Interdisciplinar Seminar Isabel Torres for Women's and Gender Studies from 2004 to 2010. Since the 1980s she has been an active cooperator for the academization of Women's and Gender Studies. Within this field, she collaborates with several national and international professional associations, and she has been Secretary of the Spanish Association of Research of the History of Women. In 2011, the University of Cantabria awarded her the I Prize for Gender Equality. During her sessions in the GEMMA Programme, on 28th and 29th October, the students worked on texts about the following subjects:

  • Meanings of the Body. Understanding and Taking Care of the Female Body: Medical Discourses and Women's Experiences in Pre-Modern Europe

November 2014

Inaugural Conference

On Tuesday, November 4th, the Inaugural Conference for GEMMA's 8th Edition took place. The speaker this year was Mª Ángeles Durán Heras, professor of Sociology and researcher specialized in Social Sciences at the National Research Council. She was the first woman to obtain the chairmanship of a department of Sociology in Spain. She is the founder of the Institute of Women's Studies at the Autonomous University of Madrid. She was the president of the Spanish Federation of Sociology, as well as a member of the executive committee of the International Sociology Association. She has also been awarded the title of Doctor Honoris Causa by the Autonomous University of Madrid. As an Economics and Sociology professor, the highlights of her intellectual work include her ongoing efforts to open up new fields of research, making visible the interdependence between private and public life, as well as the situation of social groups that had hitherto attracted little interest. She is the author of the book El valor del tiempo (“The value of time”) (2008), where she offers a framework of reflections on the new problems that we find in today's modern society; problems related to the distribution of time, where a part of the population - especially women - are suffering from an overload of domestic and care duties.

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Invited Scholars

Mª Ángeles Durán Heras. In addition to being in charge of the Inaugural Conference, professor Durán also gave a lecture on November 4th, as a part of the module Feminist Theory: Equality, Difference and Diversity, coordinated by professor Cándida Martínez. She and the students worked on the following subjects:

  • Healthcare Economics. Domestic Economics. The value of Time.

Rosa Cobo Bedía, tenured professor of Gender Sociology at the University of A Coruña. She was the founder and the first Director of the Interdisciplinary Seminar of Feminist Studies of the mentioned University from 2000 to 2003.rosa coboShe coordinated the Master's Degree on Gender and Policies on Equality at the University of A Coruña from 2005 to 2008. Her main research field is Feminist Theory and Gender Sociology. She is the author of the recently published book Hacia una nueva política sexual. Las mujeres ante la reacción patriarcal (“New Sexual Politics. Women after Patriarchy's Reactions”) (2011), where she analizes the new processes breeding today's patriarchy's reactions against women. Professor Cobo was an invited scholar for the module Feminist Theory: Equality, Difference and Diversity, coordinated by professor Cándida Martínez, and gave her lectures on November 5th and 6th. She presented the following subjects:

  • Simone de Beauvoir's Philosophical Feminism. Betty Friedan's Liberal Feminism. Kate Millett's Radical Feminism
  • Feminism, multiculturalism and globalization. Neo-liberalism and feminisation of poverty. Feminism, human development and public politics. Parity democracy and politics of vindication

Lina Gálvez Muñoz, professor of History and Economic Institutions at the Pablo de Olavide University, Seville. She obtained her PhD at the European University Institute of Florence and was Deputy Head of Postgraduate Studies and Ongoing Training at the Pablo de Olavide University from 2007 to 2012. She is Director of the Master's Degree in Gender and Equality from 2009 and of the PhD in Development and Citizenship, both taught at the Pablo de Olavide University. She is also a collaborator in some renowned drafting committees and publishing houses. Professor Lina Gálvez gave her lectures on November 13th and 14th, as a part of the module Feminist Theory: Equality, Difference and Diversity, coordinated by the professor Cándida Martínez. She focused on the subject of Economics and Gender.

December 2014

Katherine O’Donnell is senior lecturer at the University College of Dublin, Ireland, and she is the director of the Women’s Studies Centre at the same University. She was invited to teach two sessions within the module coordinated by professor Adelina Sánchez Espinosa Feminist Research: Case Studies II on 3rd and 4th December, and focused on the following subjects:

  • Recognising Privilege: The Trouble with Normal. Identity Politics. Gender Theories: a Revision
  • Epistemic Injustice: Power and the Ethics of Knowing

Margaret Ozierski is full-time instructor for the Deparment of Gender, Sexuality and Women's Studies at the Virginia Commonwealth University. She earned her Master's in French Cultural Studies at Columbia University and her Ph.D degree in French at Duke University. Her dissertation analyzed human subjectivity emerging from the discourses of Barthes, Foucault and Agamben, as it is figured in a critical mode by the artworks of Jacques Rivette and Samuel Beckett. She gave her lectures in GEMMA within the modules coordinated by professor Adelina Sánchez Gender, Art and Literature: The Representation of Women in Literary and Visual Discourse on 9th, 10th, 11th, 12th, 15th and 16th December and Feminist Research: Case Studies II on 17th, 18th and 19th December. She focused on the subject of Film Noir and Gender through the critical analysis of films as Drive and Under the Skin.

January 2015

Sonia Fernández Hoyos is associated profesor at the University of Lorraine (Metz), where she teaches Spanish Literature and Literary Theory, among others. After obtaining her PhD in Spanish Literature at the University of Granada, she did research at New York University and New York State University (Stonybrook). She was a student of the 1st edition of GEMMA Master´s Programme and received postdoctoral contracts in Utrecht and Paris. She was an invited professor for the modules Feminist Research: Case Studies II and Gender, Art and Literature: Representation of Women in Literary and Visual Discourses on 8th and 9th January. She focused on the following subjects:

  • Reading as a Woman. The Female Reader and the Literary Canon. How we read / what we read. Reading Women’s Writing. Feminist models of reading
  • Feminist Theories. Introduction to Literary Theory

Meri Torras Francès is a tenured professor of Theory of Literature and Comparative Literature at the Universitat Autònoma of Barcelona. Her research interests include autograph, epistolary genre, Women Studies, Queer theory and cultural studies, and she is especially engaged in the comparatism between literature and audiovisuals. She was invited to give a lecture on 22nd January as part of the module Feminist Methodologies: Analysis and Interpretation of Literary Texts and Women Images, coordinated by professor Milena Rodríguez, and talked about the following subjects:

  • Body and Text. An Approach to Body as a Cultural Representation.

February 2015

Elena Casado has a PhD in Sociology from the Universidad Complutense de Madrid with an extraordinary award (2002). Her research fields are Sociology and Theory of Comunication, Sociology of Gender Relations and Sociological Theory. She was an invited professor at GEMMA for the module Feminist Methodologies C: Social Sciences and Feminist Criticism. Etnographic methodology and design of social cualitative research projects, coordinated by professors Carmen Gregorio and Ana Alcázar, on February 2nd, 3rd and 4th. In her lectures she explained the methodology used for her research projects, particularly in the field of gender violence and power relations in heterosexual couples in Spain.

Ioana Gruia, who has a PhD in Literary Theory and Comparative Literature from the University of Granada, was an invited professor for the modules Gender, Art and Literature: The Representation of Women in Literary and Visual Discourses and Feminist Research: Case Studies II on 11th and 18th February. During her lectures she and the students looked at literary texts by renowned authors such as Hélène Cixous and Sylvia Plath.

Marían López Fernández Cao has a PhD in Fine Arts and a Master's Degree in Psychotherapeutic Intervention. She is tenured professor at the Faculty of Education at the Universidad Complutense de Madrid, and the coordinator for the Interuniversity Master's Degree in Art Therapy and Artistic Education for Social Inclusion. She is the main researcher of the R&D project “Museum Collections from a Gender Perspective: Case Studies of Museo del Prado, Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, Museo Arqueológico Nacional and Museo del Traje”. This was one of the projects she shared with the GEMMA students during the modules Feminist Research: Case Studies II and Gender, Art and Literature: The Representation of Women in Literary and Visual Discourses, on 16th and 17th February. In addition, she also looked at the following subjects:

  • Women and Visual Arts: Women in Imagery and Women as Creators.

March 2015

On March 6th, 2015, as part of the programme of the course Gender, class and race in Colonial America, coordinated by professor Mª Ángeles Gálvez, first year students of GEMMA had the opportunity to attend a guided visit to the Archivo Histórico de Protocolos (Archive of Rare and Historical Manuscripts) of Granada. Amalia García Pedraza, a historian with a PhD in History and person in charge of the Archives, accompanied the students during the visit and showed them the protocols of Granada from the 16th century to the 20th century.

Guadalupe Graciela Vélez Bautista was an invited scholar for the module Case Studies I: Feminist Research, coordinated by professors Gerardo Rogríguez and Pilar Villar, on March 12th and 13th. Graciela Vélez is a professor at the Universidad Autónoma of the State of Mexico, where she obtained her PhD in Social Sciences. Her research interests revolve around gender and social inequalities. During her GEMMA sessions she talked about the following topics:

  • Masculinities. Power, Identity and Gender-based Violence.
  • Violence against Women in Mexico.

Sara Martín Alegre was an invited scholar for the module Case Studies I, on March 19th and 20th. She has a PhD in English Language and Literature and is tenured professor at the Universidad Autónoma of Barcelona, where she teaches English Literature, Gender Studies and Cultural Studies, among others. Her GEMMA sessions revolved around the topic of Heroic and Anti-Heroic Masculinities, divided into two subtopics:

  • Film and Cultural Studies Adaptation of the Comic: Frank Miller's 300. The failure of the hiper-masculinization of the hero.
  • Documental, biopic and Cultural Studies: Gus Van Sant's Milk, Rob Epstein's The Times of Harvey Milk. The case of Harvey Milk and the consolidation of gay culture.

The invited scholars Irene Pérez and Paloma Fresno closed the module Case Studies I in a series of joint sessions on March 25th, 26th and 27th. Professor Irene Pérez is assistant professor at the Department of Anglo-German and French Language and Literature at the University of Oviedo. She spent some time teaching and doing research at the University of York and the University of Leicester (UK). Her research activity focuses on Space, Identity and Gender in Contemporary Literature from the English Speaking World, especially Literature by black British women writers and Asian women writers. In her GEMMA sessions she talked about:

  • Black Feminisms. Cultural Identity and Diaspora.
  • Representations of Women in Neo-Slave Literature: Joan Anim-Addo's “Daughter and His Housekeeper” and Andrea Levy's “The Long Song”.

Paloma Fresno obtained her PhD in English Language and Literature from the University of Oviedo and she is tenured professor at the Department of Spanish, Modern and Classic Language and Literature at the University of Islas Baleares, where she teaches Postcolonial Literature and Culture from the English Speaking World. Her research focuses on Postcolonial and Diasporic Literatures and Cultures, particularly from New Zealand and the Pacific. During her visit she focused on the following topics:

  • Literary Journeys in the Pacific: from the South Seas to New Oceania.
  • Representation of Women in Postcolonial Feminist Literature of the Pacific: Sia Figiel's El lugar donde nacimos and a series of poems by women writers.

April 2015

Belén Agrela was an invited scholar for the module Trabajo social e intervención social con perspectiva de género, coordinated by professors Amalia Morales and María Espinosa. Professor Agrela obtained her PhD in Social Anthropology from the University of Granada. She is a tenured professor at the Department of Psychology, Social Work and Social Services at the University of Jaén (Spain). Her research area includes gender, migration and social services, public policies for social action, the construction of inequalities and European immigration policies. In her GEMMA sessions she presented her recent R&D&I research project “Migration Policies, Familiar Transnationalism and Civic Stratification. Latinoamerican Migrations towards Spain.”

Carmen Agulló was an invited scholar for the module Transformaciones socioeducativas en la España del siglo XX: feminismo y propuestas de igualdad, coordinated by professor Victoria Robles Sanjuan, on April 15th and 16th. Professor Agulló holds a PhD in Philosophy and Science Education from the University of Valencia (Spain), where she is currently tenured professor and teaches Theory and History of Education. She has recently contributed to the realization of the documentary Las maestras de la República (2013). In her GEMMA sessions she looked at the following topics:

  • The Conquest of Citizenship, the Modern Woman and Educational Advances in the Second Spanish Republic.
  • Women Role Models in the Spanish Civil War and Feminist Consciousness.
  • Francoist Spain and the National-Catholic Woman Role Model. Counter-Role Models and Educational Spaces of Women.

Mayo 2015

Teresa del Valle Professor Emeritus of Social Anthropology at the University of País Vasco and Emakunde to Equality Award winner (2010). Was invited as visiting scholar for the module Perspectivas feministas en la antropología social, coordinated by professors Carmen Gregorio Gil and Ana Alcázar. Professor del Valle has developed her investigations in País Vasco, Micronesia, Hawaii, Mexico and North America. In her GEMMA sessions she presented her research results about chronotope (configurations of time and space), especially how Euskera language was maintained by women that use it during franquism.